A few weeks ago, Apple canceled its long-standing project to create a self-driving electric car, and has now announced the layoff of 614 employees — according to documents provided to the California Employment Development Department (although Mark Gurman notes the actual figure may be much higher).
CNBC writes Apple said that employees were informed of the layoffs on March 28, but the changes will take effect on May 27. This is the largest reduction since the pandemic for Apple — the iPhone maker was growing more slowly than other tech companies at the time, so it did not resort to large layoffs in the post-covid period.
In the announcement of the layoffs, Apple did not mention the specific projects that the laid-off employees were involved in, but it is known that they worked outside the company’s headquarters, in smaller satellite offices that were engaged in secret initiatives such as an electric car project.
According to San Francisco Chronicle Apple has cut the positions of machine shop managers, hardware engineers, and design engineers.
Recently, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported that Apple has taken on new secret projects — and probably develops a home robot and a device with a smart display.